The City of La Cañada Flintridge Small Business Grant (SBG) Program is available to local businesses that have been economically impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. The City is offering Community Development Block Grants, through the Cares ACT, in grants up to $10,000 to businesses that:
- Create or retain a job for a low-and moderate-income person
Use of Grant Funds:
Grant funds can be used for operational business expenses such as:
- Employee payroll;
- Working capital to continue operations;
- Payment of outstanding business expenses; and
- Adaptive practices needed to remain open (i.e. equipment and supplies for physical distancing).
Small Business Grant Program Eligible Businesses
Eligible Businesses
Small Businesses located in commercial locations in the City of La Cañada Flintridge with less than 500 employees that were impacted by COVID-19, are one of the following business types and meet the criteria below:
- Restaurants, coffee shops, bakeries, cafés, gastropubs, etc.
- Salons, barbers, and other grooming businesses
- Gyms, day spas, and fitness studios
- Retail and Commercial stores such as consumer goods, electronics and appliances, health and sporting goods, furniture, clothing and shoes, kitchen equipment, books and entertainment stores, music and audio/visual equipment, etc.
- Active business license in our City
- No unresolved City, municipal or health code violations
- Business in continuous operation in our City for at least two years
Small Business Grant Program Ineligible Businesses
The following business are not eligible to participate in the City’s Small Business
Grant Program:
- Any national chain that is not locally franchised
- Massage parlors, bail bond services, home-based businesses, businesses with no bona fide ground-floor commercial storefront.
- Corporate-owned fast-food restaurants (franchisees are eligible, as stated in prior Eligible Business Section)
- Check cashing, bars, liquor stores, smoke/cannabis shops, firearms retailers, pawnshops
- Non-profit organizations
- Real estate salespersons
- Financial businesses primarily engaged in the business of lending, such as banks, finance companies, and factors (pawn shops, although engaged in lending, may qualify in some circumstances)
- Passive businesses owned by developers and landlords that do not actively use or occupy the assets acquired or improved with the loan proceeds (except Eligible Passive Companies under § 120.111)
- Life insurance companies
- Businesses located in a foreign country (businesses in the U.S. owned by aliens may qualify)
- Pyramid sale distribution plans
- Businesses deriving more than one-third of gross annual revenue from legal gambling activities
- Businesses engaged in any illegal activity
- Private clubs and businesses which limit the number of memberships for reasons other than capacity
- Government-owned entities (except for businesses owned or controlled by a Native American tribe)
- Businesses principally engaged in teaching, instructing, counseling or indoctrinating religion or religious beliefs, whether in a religious or secular setting
- Loan packagers earning more than one-third of their gross annual revenue from packaging SBA loans
- Businesses with an Associate who is incarcerated, on probation, on parole, or has been indicted for a felony or a crime of moral turpitude
- Businesses in which the participating city or LACDA, or any of its Associates owns an equity interest
- Multi-national or publicly traded businesses are not eligible for this program.
- The business owner that is the subject of unresolved findings of noncompliance related to previous CDBG assistance.
- Adult businesses which:
- Present live performances of a prurient sexual nature; or
- Derive directly or indirectly more than de minimis gross revenue through the sale of products or services, or the presentation of any depictions or displays, of a prurient sexual nature.
How to Participate
Please Review the Eligible Business/list before submitting your intake form.
Businesses submit an intake form during the 5-day open application period. After the 5-day period, a lottery will be conducted and selected businesses will be requested to complete an application. The Los Angeles County Development Authority (LACDA) will work with the selected businesses on behalf of the City of La Cañada Flintridge to complete an application form, execute an agreement and provide the grant funds directly to the business owners.
Below is the timeline and corresponding due dates:
| DUE DATES | PROGRAM ACTIVITIES |
| February 28 – March 4, 2022 | Open Intake Period for Eligible Businesses |
| March 9, 2022 | Lottery conducted to select the number of eligible businesses that the SBG Program can fund. |
| March 10 – March 18, 2022 | Selected businesses will be contacted and sent a full grant application to complete and qualify to receive a grant. |
| April 8, 2022 | Deadline for selected businesses to submit complete grant applications |
| March – April 2022 | Approved grant agreements are executed, and checks issued to businesses |
